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On Monday night, during an awards ceremony in Chicago, the James Beard Foundation awarded 35 restaurants and individuals medals, catapulting them ā at least in the minds of their peers, the media, and diners who keep up with restaurant awards ā to the top of their game. The chefs who won will continue to be recognized by local and national press for years to come. Their restaurants will likely grace other lists of superlatives like best and essential and hot. But will these restaurants be busy? Will that shiny new medal get butts in seats?
According to most chefs and restaurateurs queried by Eater, the short answer is: maybe. Naomi Pomeroy, who was nominated twice for Best Chef: Northwest before she won in 2014, recalls that ābusiness picked up a lot the summer after the award.ā
Others, like Philadelphia-based Eli Kulp of High Street Hospitality Group, are less sure. āWhile I wouldnāt say there is a direct increase in business, it does help long term because the Beard Awards are most obviously a designation of consistent high quality,ā says Kulp, who has been nominated for Best Chef: Mid-Atlantic. But he notes: āI think certain awards ā Regional Chef, Outstanding Chef, or Restaurant ā have the potential for greater impact on business.ā
That uncertainty surrounding the Beardsās business influence may come as a surprise. The James Beard Awards are one of the most widely followed, well-respected annual industry awards in the U.S., but almost every chef and restaurateur we spoke to said a nomination had no impact on their business, and a win sometimes resulted in a small initial uptick in reservation requests. The effect on business over time, though challenging to assess, was nominal at best.
Precise data on what influences a restaurantās business is difficult to gather, as most do not share sales information. But according to Tiffany Fox, senior director of global corporate communications for OpenTable, in-house data suggested reservations increase after the Beard Award winners are announced. Each year, the site puts up a page dedicated to the winners, with links to reserve a table. That page tends to be a top result in Google searches for James Beard Award-winning restaurants and reservations. In 2016, the day after the awards, āwe saw our restaurant customers who made the list experience a spike in reservations that was approximately 200 percent above their normal 2016 booking baseline,ā Fox says.
This year, New York Cityās Le Coucou, a restaurant from chef Daniel Rose and restaurateur Stephen Starr, won the James Beard Award for Best New Restaurant. According to a daily monitoring of OpenTable, the restaurant booked between 200 and 300 reservations each day in the week prior to the awards ceremony. The day after Le Coucou won the Beard, according to OpenTable, over 300 tables were booked by noon local time.
According to a Le Coucou reservationist, there was a āsmall but noticeableā increase in reservations made by phone; a publicist confirmed that the restaurant booked more tables the day after the awards than on an average Tuesday but didnāt specify further.
Last year, Shaya in New Orleans took home that award, and according to general manager Shannon White, the restaurant saw an immediate uptick in reservations from both locals and tourists.
Regional awards also seem to have an impact. Portland, Oregon, chef Vitaly Paley was nominated for Best Chef: Northwest in 2003 and 2004, but when he won in 2005, āthe game changed,ā he says. āBusiness picks up, sales increased.ā For Paley, the award drove lasting momentum into his business: After the win, a publisher reached out about a cookbook, and the award ācontinues to help us attract really great talent, people who want to learn, want to be a part of something serious,ā Paley says.
But for others, only those qualitative benefits emerge. Nick Kokonas, co-owner of Chicagoās Alinea (the Beardās Outstanding Restaurant winner in 2016), says his restaurants havenāt seen the same increase in sales suggested by OpenTable. (Kokonas, it should be noted, also owns and operates the reservation system Tock, an OpenTable competitor.)
Kokonas believes the James Beard Awards have a place in the overall branding of a restaurantās success, ābut itās not one of those awards that then gets people to run to their computers to try to book a reservation instantly.ā He didnāt see an increase in traffic to Tock (which hosts 200 restaurants to OpenTables 26,000) after the 2016 Beards.
Kokonas compares Alineaās most recent Beard to other accolades earned by the restaurant and its chef Grant Achatz. When Alinea was placed at No. 6 on the Worldās 50 Best Restaurants, a somewhat controversial list that garners international attention, āthat was pretty impactful,ā he says. āBeing on that list has the greatest impact in terms of traffic.ā A nomination or a win at the Beards, he says, is just a ādifferent kind of PR.ā
Other chefs and restaurant owners agree. Mindy Segal, owner of Mindyās Hot Chocolate in Chicago, agrees. āItās so nice to receive recognition from your peers and I am honored... to have been given the award for Outstanding Pastry Chef,ā she says. āHowever, business runs as usual in my restaurant. If anything, it has made me more humble because of the national recognition that the awards helped me achieve.ā
Chef Suzanne Goin and her business partner Caroline Styne are two of the most high-profile restaurant professionals in Los Angeles. Theyāve each been nominated multiple times and won. But according to Matt Duggan, general manager at Lucques, Goinās longstanding West Hollywood flagship, the restaurant has never seen an increase in reservation requests after Goin, Styne, or one of their restaurants won a James Beard Award.
Duggan is flummoxed. āThis should matter. There should be a surge, a boost, a run on the market... but alas, the awards donāt have the immediate effect that nominees and even winners hope for year after year,ā he says. According to Duggan, being put on a ābest-of list or getting a placement in a city magazine will give you a shot in the arm. Youāll see a very direct cause and effect. When we were named No. 1 in Los Angeles magazine, the phones lit up the next day.ā But the day after Goin was named Outstanding Chef, āthings seem to proceed much as they were.ā
Duggan posits that the difference has to do with demographics. āThere are diners that want to check out the hot new thing and there are diners that want something of consistent quality,ā he says. āOver time James Beard Awards generate meaningful business, validating the choice of regular clientele and encouraging your hardcore, chef-watching audience to seek out that reservation.ā
That audience, whether they found out about Lucques via a review in the Los Angeles Times, an online list, or a Yelp review, is making a reservation as a ānotch in the belt,ā Duggan says. They want to be able to say, when the next award hits, the next list comes out, āOh Lucques? I dined there...ā
Regardless of whether or not they saw an award win as a traffic driver, every chef and restaurateur said that a nomination or win was at the very least an important acknowledgment from the restaurant community, an indication that they were doing something right. āThe awards are great recognition from your peers and absolutely raises the morale of the entire team and food community,ā Kulp says, noting that since Philadelphia is not included in the Michelin ratings, the Beard awards are the most prestigious national award of that type in his city.
āJames Beard Awards feel emotionally different for me,ā chef and restaurateur Alex Stupak says. āI love the purity of it: You got voted to win by your colleagues, by people who have won that award in the past. That makes it really special. Iām not trying to sound pessimistic about it. I donāt believe it equates to increased sales, but I donāt think it hurts one bit.ā
Daniela Galarza is a senior editor at Eater. Ha Gyung Lee is a freelance illustrator.
Editor: Erin DeJesus
⢠The Full List of James Beard Foundation Awards 2017 Winners [E]